Leadership attack

PORTIA SIMPSON Miller’s lack of education certificates, going against a new breed of emerging academically sound and politically savvy People’s National Party (PNP) middle-class recruits, would cause her to be mercilessly attacked in 1992 when she challenged P.J. Patterson for the leadership of the party after an ailing Manley decided to quit. She lost badly and retreated to the political back doors publicly but remained at

the forefront of popularity for all politicians across parties.

In that contest with Patterson, she survived one of the most brutal leadership attacks in the party’s history.

PNP women were the main attack dogs challenging her intellectual capacity, which would later provide fodder for the JLP in the 2007 general election.

Simpson Miller herself appeared to provide fodder for her opponents, seeming uninformed on some matters and, other times, wild and colourful on the political platform, as in the “don’t draw my tongue” outburst for which she has expressed regret. Still, she remained one of Jamaica’s most famous politicians.

That popularity would lead her to becoming the first female president of the PNP and the first woman to lead a Jamaican political party to victory at the polls.

See The Gleaner on Thursday for that side of the Portia tale.